1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an image recording apparatus for recording time-serial images and adapted to observe variations with the lapse of time of an object through these time-serial images and an endoscope observing apparatus adapted to observe variations with the lapse of time of the object.
2. Related Art Statement
Recently, an endoscope has become known whereby organs within a body cavity can be observed by inserting an elongate insertable part into the body cavity and various therapeutic treatments can be made by using treating instruments inserted through treating instrument channels as required.
Also, there are suggested various electronic endoscopes using such solid state imaging devices as charge coupled devices (CCD""s) for imaging means.
Now, such apparatus wherein a fluorescent agent is administered to such part to be inspected as an internal organ, an exciting light is radiated to the fluorescent agent and a fluorescent image by the fluorescence issued from the above mentioned fluorescent agent is observed as is shown, for example, in the respective publications of Japanese utility model application laid open No. 173020/1984 and Japanese patent applications laid open Nos. 114543/1987, 247232/1987 and 122421/1988 and in U.S. Pat. No. 4,821,117 is known as an apparatus for inspecting the states of internal organs and the like of a human body by utilizing such endoscope.
One of the objects of the diagnosis by utilizing such fluorescent image is to find out a tumor part by discriminating a part issuing a fluorescence and a part issuing no fluorescent in one still image.
Now, the size of the fluorescence amount can be a parameter representing the amount of the agent having reached the object part during a fixed time after the fluorescent agent is administered. Therefore, such living body information as in the following can be obtained by observing the variations with the lapse of time of the fluorescence amount in the same part. First, the advance of the disease can be known by the variations with the lapse of time of the fluorescent intensity. Second, as a benign tumor and a malignant tumor are different in the time variations of the fluorescent intensity, the type can be judged by knowing the difference in the time variation. Third, such minor measurement in the circulating system as of the blood flow velocity can be made by the time difference until the fluorescence begins to issue in the respective parts. (In the part in which the blood flow velocity is high, the fluorescent substance circulates so fast that the time until the fluorescence issues is short.)
In the case of determining the variations with the lapse of time of the above mentioned fluorescence amount, it is considered to compare time-serial images, that is, a plurality of images taken at different times of the same object. In microscope images and the like having no motion, by comparing the above mentioned time-serial images, it is possible to observe the variations with the lapse of time of the fluorescence amount and the like. However, in the endoscope, the object fluctuates and the visual field fluctuates and, in each of the time-serial images, the position of the same part is not fixed. This fact makes it difficult to observe the variations with the lapse of time of the same part in the endoscope image.
By the way, in the publication of Japanese patent application laid open No. 57784/1985 is disclosed an apparatus wherein a visible image and an infrared image can be displayed as overlapped in any part on the picture. However, this apparatus is to overlap the visible image and infrared image taken at the same time but can not position each of the time-serial images.
Also, there are also known apparatus for recording and seeking time-serial images as are shown in the respective publications of Japanese patent applications laid open Nos. 43279/1987 and 6965/1988.
However, as described above, in the case of comparing time-serial images, with the conventional apparatus, a plurality of images separated in the time have not been able to be simultaneously displayed to be compared and observed.
In the endoscope inspection and the like, still images have been recorded and reproduced and it is desired to record and reproduce the above mentioned time-serial images together with Such Still images.
However, an apparatus for recording and reproducing time-serial images and an apparatus for recording and reproducing still images have respectively singly existed but there has been no apparatus handling time-serial images and still images simultaneously as related with each other. Therefore, there has been a defect that, in the case of seeking, for example, a desired image, the seeking will be troublesome.
Also, for example, a video disc recorder apparatus is known as an image recording apparatus. This is to record and reproduce video signals on the tracks of a photodisc and has features that both still pictures and moving pictures can be recorded and reproduced and further a random access to a specific frame of the image can be easily made.
Now, in the endoscope inspection, for example, in case, while noting the observed part, an agent is administered to the person to be inspected and the variations of the observed part by the agent are investigated, with the above mentioned video disc recorder apparatus, the moving picture will be recorded or the still image will be recorded intermittently at a predetermined timing and thereafter the images recorded as ordered by these time-series will be reproduced to make a more accurate observation.
By the way, in the publication of Japanese patent application laid open No. 6965/1988 is shown an image seeking apparatus wherein a frame feeding to images and a frame feeding to images separated by a fixed number of images can be made by a simple operation.
In the case of making such endoscope inspection as is described above, it will be important to respectively reproduce and comparatively observe the image with which a fixed time has elapsed after the agent was administered and the image with which a fixed time has further elapsed after that. However, even a moving image record, for example, for several minutes will be several thousand frames. Therefore, it has been difficult to correctly select and reproduce a desired image out of them.
Even if the technique disclosed, for example, in the publication of the above described Japanese patent application laid open No. 6965/1988 is used, as the seeking of such image as is related in time is not considered, the above mentioned problem will not be solved.
OBJECTS AND SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An object of the present invention is to provide an image recording apparatus for recording time-serial images and making it easy to observe in detail the variations with the lapse of time of an object with these time-serial images.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an image recording apparatus for recording time-serial images and making it easy to observe the variations with the lapse of time of the same part in these time-serial images.
Further another object of the present invention is to provide an image recording apparatus for recording time-serial images and making it possible to simultaneously observe images separated in the time among these time-serial images.
Further another object of the present invention is to provide an image recording apparatus for recording time-serial images and still images and capable of recording and seeking said time-serial images and still images as related with each other.
Further another object of the present invention is to provide an image recording apparatus for recording time-serial images and correctly and quickly selecting a desired image out of these time-serial images.
Further another object of the present invention is to provide an endoscope observing apparatus for making it easy to observe the variations with the lapse of time of the same part in time-serial images.
The image recording apparatus of the present invention comprises a time-serial image recording means for recording time-serial images of an object and an outputting means capable of outputting the data of at least a part of the above mentioned time-serial images to be recorded or having been recorded in the above mentioned time-serial image recording means as made to correspond to the information related to the observation of the variations with the lapse of time of the above mentioned object. Also, the endoscope observing apparatus comprises an extracting means for extracting the feature of at least one image of the time-serial images and a composing means for composing and outputting the image information of the feature extracted by the above mentioned extracting means and the above mentioned time-serial images or comprises a recognizing means for making one image of the time-serial images an image to be a standard of the position and recognizing the identical part between this one image and the other images among the above mentioned time-serial images and a data outputting means for outputting the data of the part recognized to be the identical part by the above mentioned recognizing means among the above mentioned other images.
The other features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent enough with the following explanation.